Does My Kid Have a Stuttering Problem?

My little guy, Logan, has always been a talker. His parents are talkers so he had no choice in the matter really. He has a great vocabulary and we chit chat about everything, which sometimes feels odd considering he’ll be 3 in August.

In the past few months hubby and I have noticed that he’s starting to stutter, but we didn’t think too much of it figuring it for just a phase. Now in the past few days it’s gotten a lot worse. Yesterday in driving home from daycare he asked me if we were going to drive on the bridge, which he often does but it took him a good 15 seconds to get the W in the “we” out. I wasn’t sure what was happening all I heard was an increasingly loud “wuh wuh wuh wuh wuh” so I turned to look at him and saw his face was red. My heart broke a bit. He was fighting to get the words out.

Later that evening hubby and I talked again about the stuttering. It only happens when he’s excited, you can see the wheels turning in his head and he is getting frustrated he can’t get the words out. Sometimes he gets so worked up and starts to jump as if to shake the words loose. It’s always the first word of the sentence once he’s over that hump, the words tumble out rapid fire.

I Googled stuttering toddlers and found that sometimes it’s the kids looking for the right word to use. That’s not my Logan, he knows what he wants to say he just can’t say it. Most of the websites said to respond with patience, maintain eye contact while they’re stuttering and not to make them feel self conscious. Then you are to repeat the sentence in your response so they know how it’s supposed to sound.

I also found that stuttering runs in families and we’ve got stutterers in ours, plus it’s more common in boys than girls.

We have a friend that is a speech therapist and I’ll give her a ring as well as see what his doctor thinks. I know there’s tons of great resources out there, why not try them? But I have to admit it’s a bit scary. Though it’s not anything near like a terminal disease or even a curable disease, you just don’t want your kid to have any issues. I think of the little boy in school who was teased for his stutter and had to leave class to meet with the speech therapist. I don’t want my little boy to be that little boy. But inhale. Exhale. It’s just a stutter and I’m sure it’ll be fine.